


we're from the ocean (for the sea)

by sevener



Category: Hockey RPF, Original Work
Genre: 2000s, Being Very Into Caring For Your Bros, Blow Jobs, First Time, Friends to Lovers, Homophobia, Like Very Into It, M/M, Magical Realism, Mythical Beings & Creatures, Period Typical Attitudes, Touch-Starved
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-22
Updated: 2020-10-22
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:48:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27150659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sevener/pseuds/sevener
Summary: At this point he’s pretty much heard it all anyway - leech, soul eater, succubus… If you could think of it, Mason’s probably had it spat in his face.
Relationships: OMC/OMC
Comments: 35
Kudos: 152





	we're from the ocean (for the sea)

**Author's Note:**

> Someone tell me why I started writing a piece about a touch-dependent hockey bro and then mid-way through decided that it should be set in Vancouver… oh, and also in 2006.  
>   
> I think I thought it’d be funny? Turns out it’s actually pretty hard to capture the exact _je ne sais quois_ of the year in a fic about homophobia and friendship that is also a Magical Realism AU with biblical demons. Or at least, implied biblical demons. Don’t ask me how my brain works.  
> Anyway, to set the mood, here are some notable facts about 2006, (which was a pretty weird year):  
> \- Erik Johnson, Jordan Staal, and Jonathan Toews were the top three draft picks  
> \- Borat came out in November (meaning the film was released. Borat did not come out as gay)  
> \- Stephen Harper was the PM of Canada, George W. Bush was the President of the U.S.  
> \- Facebook was a mere 2 years old  
> \- Twilight (the book) was 1 year old (the movie wouldn’t come out for another two years)  
> \- Bad Day by Daniel Powter, Temperature by Sean Paul, and Promiscuous by Nelly Furtado were top three on the Billboard 100  
> \- The Atlanta Thrashers were still the Atlanta Thrashers, and they won their division this year. Also, coincidentally, this would be their highest attended season ever. RIP Thrashers.  
> \- The Hurricanes won the cup  
> \- Star Wars Kid and Evolution of Dance were viral videos  
> I think that pretty much covers it, but feel free to comment with your favourite parts of 2006 if you feel I’ve missed anything vital. Most of all, enjoy this kinda-sorta creature fic - and Happy Halloween!
> 
> [Content Notes/Minor Spoilers: Consistent with the homophobia tag, this fic contains recurrent use of homophobic slurs, including the f-slur, both by and against gay characters. Not tagged, the POV character engages in limited sex acts while under the influence of alcohol. On the ‘touch-starved’ tag; the POV character engages in behaviours which, because of his unique biology, are akin to wilful starvation and/or disordered eating; though these actions don’t involve actually depriving himself of literal food, it has an analogous effect and is treated as such by other characters. If you have any questions about these warnings or think that they should be better tagged please let me know.]

➮ ➮ ➮

Mason drops into his seat with a sigh, ready for a quick flight to Dallas so he can sack out and forget the frustration of getting shut down by Coburn at every turn. Atlanta had kicked their asses pretty thoroughly tonight, but their D especially had just been fucking relentless. Coach's choice words for them after that shit-show were still ringing in Mason's head.

It’s just after takeoff, and Mason is leaning back into his shitty airplane seat when he feels something nudge at his leg. He slits an eye open.

“You good?” whispers Parker.

It’s dark in the cabin, but Mason can still see the hand Parker is holding out, feel the back of his knuckles where they’re pressed to the side of Mason’s thigh. He warms, and lets his own hand fall to cover Parker’s, feeling the jolt right down to his bones as Parker opens to him instantly.

“Thanks,” murmurs Mason.

He carefully doesn’t let their fingers thread, just tucks their clasped hands down towards the hollow space between the seats where their thighs aren’t touching. His eyelids lower as his exhaustion pulls away like a slowly shrinking tide, the tactile connection lighting him up from the inside. Mason squeezes Parker’s hand once in gratitude, and tracks the small smile that springs up at the corner of the other man’s mouth.

Across the aisle, Morrison leans forward out of his seat towards them. 

Sneers,  “Look, I know you’ve gotta leech off the guy, but do you always have do it in the faggiest way possible?”

Mason rolls his eyes, hand tightening around Parker’s despite himself.

“Get fucked man,” he shoots back tiredly. Not even worth it, at this point.

“No, hey, I get it,” Morrison smirks a little. “I just find it interesting that you never seem to harass anyone else for the touchy-feelies. I wonder what our boy Parker here thinks about being your permanent live in boyfriend slash meal plan.”

And before Mason can so much as open his mouth Parker snatches his hand away, the warm flow of energy cutting off abruptly between them.

Parker doesn’t even glance at Mason. He crosses his arms over his chest, drawing attention to the fact that he’s about 30 pounds heavier than Morrison, and flicks a dismissive look across the aisle. 

“Fuck off Brendan.”

Morrison waggles his eyebrows with an impish grin, but fucking finally turns back in his seat to pester Burrows on his other side. Cold day in hell the minute Brendan Morrison isn’t making it his business to bother _someone_.

That done, Parker relaxes back against his own seat with a sigh and closes his eyes. There’s a line of frustration that cuts down his forehead, just off of centre. Mason waits, chewing his lip restlessly, but Parker doesn’t put his hand back. He doesn’t open his eyes again.

Mason turns to look out the porthole window to his right and watches the endless black of the sky streak by, hands tucked up under his armpits. Sits and chews his lip to blood.

➮ ➮ ➮

His first and best instinct is to let it roll off him. Dismiss and ignore it. At this point he’s pretty much heard it all anyway - leech, soul eater, succubus… If you could think of it, Mason’s probably had it spat in his face. Worrying himself over petty digs from shitheads like Morrison would be the worst kind of exercise in futility. He knows that.

And it’s stupid, anyway, ‘cuz Parker isn’t just his teammate, isn’t some guy doing Mason a favour ‘cuz the team asked him to. He’s Mason’s friend. If Mason’s whole… _thing_ bothered him, he’d have kindly told him to fuck off already. There's no reason to doubt that, except...

Well the thing is, is that Parker’s _nice_. 

Like, hand you the shirt right off his back, climb a tree to rescue your stranded kitten - _nice_ nice. 

Definitely too nice to just come out and say that he thinks Mason’s whole deal is fucking weird and humiliating for the both of them. That maybe Morrison has a point. Like, what kind of grown ass man has some touch-dependent psychic thing and goes to his _teammate_ for it? His very _male_ teammate, by the way, instead of finding some willing puckbunny to sate his need for the night. Who the fuck would want to spend half an hour holding hands and sharing a bed with another dude if he could help it?

And like, _yeah_. Mason has pretty much nothing he can say to that.

The plain and simple is that he needs it, just how everyone else needs food and water. And Parker is always _right there_ , easy and willing and open. But that doesn’t really make it better, because he _likes_ it, too. Likes it when Parker slings an arm over his shoulders or scoots over to make room for Mason on his hotel bed, likes the press of their palms together as they ride in cars and on team planes. Likes the casual comfort of it, more than he probably should.

Because Parker doesn’t. Doesn’t get anything from this arrangement except for discomfort and humiliation and slurs hurled at him from his own team, and he’s just too goddamn _nice_ to say that to Mason’s face.

Probably he’s assumed Mason can’t go to anyone else. That Parker is his only option. ‘Cuz why the hell else would Mason only ever see _him_ for it, right? 

But Mason can. He can find someone else, a stranger, even, if he really needs to. It’s not like he hasn’t before.  He’s not going to let himself take advantage of Parker’s touch any more than he already has.

➮ ➮ ➮

The first time Mason tries to go to someone else, it’s like, basically a train-wreck.

Actually, the _very_ first time he tries to go to someone else, he ends up awkwardly stuttering through an explanation of what he needs while Edler - who has so far seemed chill and down for pretty much whatever - gives him a strange, measuring look.

“Yeah I’m like, _definitely_ a Christian, so. Pretty sure that’s a big ‘no’ on letting a demon chow down on my soul or whatever.”

Mason fidgets, reminding himself for the hundredth time not to let the annoyance show on his face. He’s fallen into the trap of arguing with Christians about petty distinctions before.

“I totally get it, and I can definitely take no for an answer, so this isn’t me trying to convince you out of that or anything,” he says earnestly. “I just- I need you to know that I don’t, like, ‘chow down’ on anything. I’m not trying to steal your soul or something, I just need to be kinda, uh, close to it?”

It’s probably not reassuring that Mason can’t explain it much better than that. Not without getting really technical.

Edler gives him a long look. There’s a silver cross on the end of the chain around his neck, and Mason tries not to take it too personally when his hand comes up to absently fiddle with it.

“Don’t you and Reed have some kind of deal? He beg off or something?”

And Mason could lie, but knowing his team that shit would get right back to Parker in a heartbeat, and then Mason would have to explain himself. Not an option here.

“No, we’re all good,” he says quickly. “Never mind then.”

He hauls ass to his truck and gets the hell away from the arena, already thinking about who else he could ask. It’s been a day since their flight home from California, three days since he last fed, and they have a game tonight and another tomorrow, so he’ll need to lock down an alternative before they leave for the next roadie after that. If he’s completely juiced Parker will definitely offer himself, and if Mason runs through the roster looking for a substitute there’s no way Parker (if not the whole team) won’t end up suspicious. Which leaves only one other option.

Fortunately they take the W against Detroit that night, which is good for all of them, and the boys want to go out afterwards, which is good for Mason. 

At least, it’s good for as long as it takes him to throw back three shots of tequila and hustle out onto the dance floor, good when a leggy brunette with a short denim skirt and shiny purple lip gloss moves her body up against his, and good when she slots their mouths together, her lips sticky and peach flavoured. And then he moves his mouth to her jaw, and asks for what he needs, murmuring hot against her skin.

“Wait, oh my god!” She yells back, mouth _way_ too close to his ear. “Oh my god, I’ve heard of this. You’re an incubus!”

Mason _just_ manages not to blurt _I think you mean succubus -_ because he isn’t that, either. Instead he shakes his head and shifts in close again.

“Not exactly. I just need to touch you for a while, feel your energy,” he says, as clear as he can over the thumping bass. “I promise it doesn’t hurt you. You probably won’t even feel it.”

Her eyes are dark and wide when he pulls back to meet her gaze. She bites her lip on a smile and then finally nods. “Okay yeah, I think I get it.”

Mason refrains from actually fist-pumping in reaction. They press close together again, his hands on her hips, and she threads one manicured hand through his hair, directing his mouth down to her neck. Breathes, “Touch me.”

His hands dip under the hem of her low-cut tank top to roam the skin of her back, smooth and a little tacky with sweat. He lets himself feel the edge of his fatigue, the ache that carves right down to his marrow, and carefully unfurls it, reaching for her. Sure enough, the vital spark of her humanity is raw and exposed when he looks for it, made open and willing by her desire, her offering.

Mason basks in it, lets it warm him from the inside out. It’s been so long since he’s done this with anyone other than Parker, and he worried, nonsensically, that it might not work, that he’d forgotten how to do it with anyone else. Turns out it’s kinda hard to forget something as instinctive as breathing.

He kisses absently at her neck, mouth moving mindless and comforting to pass the time, and the soft little noises she makes because of it are pleasing in an abstract way. She seems content to be held and kissed, relaxing into it, so it’s the last thing Mason’s expecting when she ducks her head and twists, suddenly, to bite him hard on the neck. 

Like, _hard,_ on the neck.

Mason releases her immediately with a panicked “What the fuck!” and stumbles backwards.

His head spins from the tequila, and when his gaze settles back on her she’s smiling at him, pleased. There’s a dark stain across the front of her teeth. He clamps a hand to his neck, reeling, and feels his palm slip in hot blood.

“What the _fuck?_ ” he repeats, slightly more hysterical this time.

“I know what you are,” she says, way too calmly, eyes intent. “ _Dhampir._ ”

Mason gapes. “Fucking excuse me _?_ ”

And just when he assumes he’s hit the ceiling for batshit crazy, this tiny girl in platform boots and _way_ too much eyeliner suddenly breaks through the crowd, rounding on him and inserting herself between Mason and Vampire Chick.

“Get back!” she commands, holding a necklace out in front of her like a talisman. There’s a small gold cross flashing at the end of it. Because of fucking course there is. “Back off demon!”

Mason can’t help but roll his eyes. More and more people around them are beginning to notice the commotion, turning to stare or just turning away entirely. It would be just his fucking luck for this entire shit-show to end with half the club thinking he’s some bloodthirsty coffin-dweller with a neck fetish (or, judging by the teeth marks on his own, a big fan of them). 

He’s _just_ wondering if it would be worth it to try and clarify or if he’d be better off playing along and cringing from the cross when Mason feels a warm, familiar hand come to grip his elbow.

He turns to find Parker there, all 6’4” and 200-some pounds of him inserting himself between Mason and this wannabe vampire hunter, frowning down at her like she might make a move at any moment. Like she has any real moves to make here.

“Problem?” he barks at the two girls, not once looking over at Mason.

Buffy-Lite opens her mouth to answer, but Mason grabs Parker before this nonsense has a chance to reach absurdist-comedy levels of weird, as in Parker Reed trying to defend him from Gothic Amateur-Hour at the back of some vodka-soaked Vancouver nightclub levels of weird.

“Let’s just get the fuck out of here,” Mason shouts over the music.

Thankfully, Parker doesn’t argue. He hauls Mason out towards the club’s main exit like it’s his job, palm spread hot and single-minded at the small of Mason’s back.

It’s not until they’re standing out in the unflattering light of the street that Parker reels on him, frowning and gearing up for what Mason’s sure is an epic lecture about _not hooking up in public_ and _Willie would throw a fit if he knew_ (Parker’s _such_ the goody-two shoes, seriously, he’s practically a Willie Mitchell Jr.). But then his eyes snap to Mason’s neck.

“Did that chick fucking _bite you_?”

Mason slaps a hand over the broken skin self-consciously, just as Parker crowds in close. He’s had his fair share of tequila tonight and Parker’s frown has his stomach twisting strangely. Mason just barely remembers to lock down on his hunger before Parker touches him.

“It’s cool dude, I’ll wash it out,” Mason placates, trying to step out of reach. “I’ll ice it too, man, come on.”

Parker ignores him. He gets one broad palm around the back of Mason’s neck, gently grips his wrist and pulls his hand away with the other.

“Shit,” Parker hisses, sucking air in through his teeth. Mason’s face feels way too hot. “Little Miss Dracula broke skin. Toothy bitch.”

“Hey,” Mason protests. “Relax dude, she was all…” he makes an ambiguous gesture with his free hand, “-convinced I was a vampire and shit.”

Parker gives him an exasperated look, and then he drops Mason’s wrist to dig his cell out of the tiny back pocket of his too-tight jeans. He flicks it open and dials for a cab, all without taking his other hand off the back of Mason’s neck.

“Whatever Mase, let’s just get you home so I can clean that shit out myself. She probably gave you rabies or something.”

Mason rolls his eyes, but he ends up finishing off the night with Parker’s fingers scrubbing soap and polysporin into his broken skin, taping a fat piece of gauze down carefully at the corners so he doesn’t bleed all over his pillow. It makes the damage look worse like that, like she tore out half his neck with her teeth, but Mason submits to it anyway, because there’s no use in fighting Parker when he’s like this.

Mason is hungry, bloodied, and a hundred times worse for wear after that club stunt, and when Parker tucks himself under a blanket on the couch he tells himself he’s relieved - when Parker doesn’t so much as ask if Mason needs to spend a few minutes with their palms pressed together, he tells himself that’s good.

He should’ve known this wouldn’t be easy.

➮ ➮ ➮

Mason jiggles his knee, the withdrawal setting under his skin now like a physical itch. It makes him want to tear himself apart, just a little. He presses his palms to his knees, then realizes it’s better to stuff them under his armpits. That way he can’t do something stupid like lunge across their two beds and try to curl up around Parker like an unwanted stray.

Parker looks up from his PSP. Frowns.

“What’s up man? You need to come over here for a bit?” He pats the open space on the hotel bedspread.

Mason stares harder at the TV screen, watching Arnold Schwarzenegger blow up a car. Or maybe a plane. He has no idea which Terminator movie he’s pretending to watch. Hell, this may actually be The Running Man.

It’d be a lot easier to focus if Parker weren’t being so goddamn considerate.

“Nah, I’m cool,” Mason says, making his tone overly casual. “I’ll go out later if I really need it.”

There’s silence from the other bed. Mason can _feel_ Parker’s eyes on him, probably all suspicious and unconvinced and shit. Fuck. He has to play it cool - the last thing he needs is to give away the play and have Parker fight him on this. Because he would.

“I’m seriously fine man,” Mason insists again, turning his head to make eye contact and everything this time. “Go back to your little skateboarding game.”

Parker snorts, but that finally gets him to drop it. 

“It’s Tony Hawk man, get a grip.”

If only Mason could. Parker slipped his hand into his over the centre console for the hour’s drive to the airport, so really, Mason should be fine. Except for how that was five hours ago, and he’s been purposefully not asking Parker for anything, even when he can feel himself needing it, only saying yes every other time Parker offers, because it’d be too dead a giveaway if he just quit cold turkey. At this point Mason’s weaning them both off, really - the only problem being that he needs another source of energy to wean _on_ , and so far, finding willing strangers has been harder than he thought it’d be.

Probably it’s an obvious statement that not many people jump at the chance to bare their souls to a complete stranger, but it’s not like that’s Mason’s deal anyway. No matter how many times he explains it, people don’t seem to understand that it’s just the feeling of life he needs. The touch of a breathing, feeling thing - no eating, sucking, or stealing involved. Somehow that’s hard to translate when he’s yelling an explanation into some girl’s ear over the pounding beat of “Buttons” blasting through nightclub speakers.

It’s not like he’s been striking out completely, but in between refusing Parker’s offers and getting shut down half the time they go out, Mason’s starting to feel like he could be tapping empty. 

He’s at the point where he’s honestly considered going off to one of the lesser-known dives in the Eastside, the kind of place with blackout windows and those cheesy reversed pentagrams painted over the doorway. The only thing holding him back is the visceral image of Parker’s epically disappointed eyebrows frowning at him, and how thoroughly Willie would chew him out if he ever got caught coming out of a place like that. Media would have a fucking field day. He’d probably get traded.

So regular clubs it is - and luckily enough they’ve got plans tonight, dinner and drinks and team bonding before they face the Kings tomorrow - all on Nas’ orders. It’s good eats too, creamy pilaff and rich, fresh salmon, ocean to plate shit. Just ‘cuz Mason is never full at the end of a meal like this doesn’t mean he can’t appreciate fine LA dining. He even lets Lu flash his eyes and trick him into spending way too much money on top shelf whiskey even though - as everyone keeps reminding him - he’s too young to really get the point of the stuff. Liquor is liquor, after all.

Dinner done, Mason piles into a cab with Kes and Juice, squeezed into the back with Parker’s elbow jammed under his ribs. Juice makes loud small talk with the driver the whole way there, his fuzzy ears twitching excitedly, fangs long in his mouth already. The place they end up at is mid-to-high end, because as much as they like to protest, Kes and Juice are fancy fucks at heart.

They all have a round together, vodka sodas with not enough vodka, in Mason’s opinion. The crowd surrounding them is sleek and shiny, everyone skinny in a way that’s honestly starting to freak Mason out. Does the diet plan come free with a spot on the guest list?

“You good?”

Mason looks up to find Parker watching him, the blue and pink lights playing in flashes over his sandy hair. It’s getting a little long, curling over his ears and sticking out awkwardly at the sides. Mason stares at it, and then remembers the question.

“Yeah. Gonna dance!”

He tosses back the rest of his vodka soda and doesn’t ask if Parker wants to join. The guy’s not really a big dancer, and that suits Mason just fine. He can fly solo. He’s a lone wolf, and he’s on the prowl.

Mason snorts at himself and shakes away the drunken thought as bodies his way through the bar-side crowd and out to the edge of the dance floor. The people are no less intimidating here, and Mason is overly aware of his own bulk in contrast to the lithe and graceful bodies surrounding him.

He tries to lose himself in it anyway, the vodka finally kicking in and helping smooth the way. Mason tips his head back, and then shudders as a sudden sensation wracks him unexpectedly.

A hand drags down the length of his forearm, leaving bright sparks in its wake, a shiver of energy that shakes down to Mason’s bones. He’s too shocked to move away, and when Mason finally turns his head there’s a guy standing in front of him, lips pulled wide around a friendly smile.

“I know what you are,” the guy shouts, still smiling, taking a step closer to be heard over the pumping bass, and for a second Mason freezes, thinking of the last person to say to him. The bloodstains on her teeth.

But the guy shifts his grip up to Mason’s elbow then, the touch gentle but purposeful, and energy floods him again in a sudden burst. There and gone too soon. Memories of Vampire Chick drift away like smoke on the wind.

“You do?” he shouts back, and then, before the guy can answer, “How are you doing that?”

The guy smiles again, and Mason notices that his teeth are short and sharp and perfectly straight in a row. It’s not a bad smile. The guy’s shirt is airy and half-translucent - Mason’s pretty sure he can see the dude’s dark nipples through the material.

“This okay?” the guy half-shouts, not answering the question, but Mason doesn’t care about that because there’s the sudden slow drag of palms, hands skimming up the backs of his biceps, and cool, clean warmth slides under his skin. He has no idea how, but the guy seems to be able to moderate the flow of it, and he pushes more through Mason without ever pressing down with his fingertips. Mason struggles not to lean too far into it.

“Holy shit, it’s so okay,” he says nonsensically.

They’re standing close together, unmoving in the tide of the dancers around them, and Mason knows he’s gotta snap out of it - he doesn’t know this guy, he’s in public, and they’re practically holding each other now, close like they’re gonna start slow dancing. His teammates could be right behind him. 

It’s just, it’s been so long since this - the simplicity of this, not having to explain himself. Just hands on his skin, no fear or doubt or uncertainty. He doesn’t want it to stop.

“Can we,” Mason licks his lips. “Wanna go somewhere?”

It’s fumbling, but the guy seems to get it. He tangles one hand with Mason’s and leads them off to the left, to a dark hallway tucked between two heavy, pulsing speakers. There’s a glowing red exit sign lighting the space and nothing else. It makes Mason notice the carved lines of the guy’s face, even at arm’s length, and the strange, almost violet sheen to his eyes. Mason wants to ask, but he hates when people ask, so he just keeps his mouth shut.

“Good?” the guy asks at a regular volume. It’s a lot quieter back here. Mason’s ears are ringing.

“Yeah,” he croaks, and then, awkwardly. “Uh, what’s your name?”

The guy smiles, easy. “Ari.”

Mason nods. “Moose.”

It comes out before he can think about it. He’s sure, at least, that he shouldn’t be attaching his real name to this interaction.

“Moose?” Ari giggles.

Mason shrugs.

“Uh, yeah, uh. Nickname.”

Ari runs his palms up and down Mason’s forearms gently. Mason has no idea when he moved to press his hands to the wall on either side of Ari’s hips, but it’s where they are now. It makes it easier for Ari to touch him, and that electric heat crawls up under his skin again.

“I figured,” Ari says. Mason blinks, trying to focus on the conversation. Ari smiles like he can tell, and finds it endearing.

And the thing is, is that Mason sees it coming. He has time to stop it. Flinch away, move back, fuck, shove the guy off and run. He’s in public, his goddamn _teammates_ are in the building, and he’s not - he’s _not_. He swore he wouldn’t be, not out here, not if he’s gonna play National League fucking Hockey. He _needs_ to stop this.

But he doesn’t. Mason lets Ari’s weight press unmistakably into his skin, lets his lips press soft and sure over his own, surprisingly gentle for a drunken kiss in a dark hallway stained with stale beer and mindless music. Ari smells good, spicy and flowery at the same time, and his mouth burns a hot trail over Mason’s, down his jaw to the sensitive spot under his ear. Mason gasps, too loud, and his hands snag in the insubstantial cloth of Ari’s shirt, holding on as he shivers in his skin, as energy pulses, quicksilver, through his veins.

“Feels good,” Mason groans, low and scratchy.

Ari’s teeth flash red in the dark when he smiles, and Mason grabs him again, bringing their faces together so he can kiss him hot and deep and desperate, moaning when Ari pushes more energy towards him. His fingers skitter at the small of Ari’s back, dip inches under his high waistband to feel the slick skin there.

A nearby shriek slices through Mason’s lust like a cleaver, and he springs back away from Ari, shoulders hitting the wall behind him. When he looks up it’s just a party girl standing at the open end of the narrow hallway, the front of her slinky dress stained dark with booze, plastic cup lying empty and inert at her feet. Not even looking at them.

Mason lets out a strained breath. 

He turns to find Ari already watching him, eyes scanning his face. He doesn’t look phased by what just happened, but then again the guy’s wearing a sheer top and what look to be leather pants. He probably makes out with random guys in nightclub shadows every other week. Mason is torn between the sudden urge to yell at him, and to put his hands all over him.

Ari raises an eyebrow, then walks slowly backwards until his hips hit the push bar on the door behind him. It cracks open to reveal the empty alleyway beyond. No alarms go off, nobody even notices when Ari disappears through it. Mason smirks and follows him out into the California-night warm air.

Ari catches him by the elbows and pulls until Mason is pressing him into the exposed brick wall, and then kisses him.

And Mason couldn’t tell you why he does what he does next. He’s grateful for this, yeah, but he’s not _that_ grateful. 

Maybe it’s the way that Ari’s all warm and shiny and - and fucking _pretty_ in his arms, his soft brown hair curling behind his ears, his nipples dark and pebbled behind the gauze of his shirt. Or maybe it’s something even simpler than that - something about the easy way Ari had touched him, open and eager and _alive_. Maybe Mason had got a taste of it, and now he selfishly wants more.

Either way he ends up on his knees in a dirty back alley, the moist heat of his quick breaths collecting in the silver mesh of Ari’s shirt. The street is dark and a little damp around him, smelling like sweat and steam and garbage, and Mason feels too hot under his skin. Overheated. He gets an unsteady hand on the fly of Ari’s insane leather trousers, and glances up.

Ari’s eyes are dark. His mouth is open, breaths a little unsteady already. One gentle, warm hand slides down to cover Mason’s.

“You don’t have to,” he whispers.

Mason unzips his pants. All the words he could say are caught behind his teeth, clenched tight. His fingers scrabble at Ari’s underwear, and then Mason’s opening his mouth to take in his half-hard dick. Working to get it harder. Ari’s thin fingers tighten around Mason’s in a vicegrip and his breath goes soft and high pitched, something in between a moan and a sigh.

Mason’s focus narrows to the heated skin under his mouth and the low sounds of pleasure above him. Blood rushes fast in his ears, like the churning of the ocean, like he’s been dunked under water and held there.

It’s why it doesn’t register it when the service door bangs open at the end of the alley, when footsteps crunch heavy over glass and gravel, heading right towards them. He doesn’t hear anything at all, until Ari swears, panicked, above him, and a familiar voice chokes out-

“Holy fucking shit.”

Mason scrambles back and away so fast it makes him dizzy, jumps to his feet and then sways drunkenly for a second while Ari frantically moves to cover himself. Mason’s stomach has relocated itself somewhere in the vicinity of his toes, and an icy-cold dread moves through his veins. Freezing him solid.

And Parker just fucking _stands_ there.

“Um,” starts Mason, dragging the back of one hand over his mouth. Ignoring how it comes away slightly sticky with spit and something else.

“What the _fuck_ Mason,” Parker explodes. “What the fuck are you-”

Parker cuts off suddenly, hands clenching into fists at his sides. Too pissed to speak, for a moment. His eyes slide to Ari, still leaning awkwardly against the brick wall behind Mason, blocked off from the mouth of the alley by Parker’s angry and imposing form. The look that Parker shoots the guy is downright acidic.

“You,” he spits, and Ari flinches under his gaze. “Get the fuck out of here already, Jesus, you fucking freak.”

Ari jumps to comply, not saying anything and avoiding both of their gazes as he rushes past and out into the street. Mason turns to glare at Parker with a frown.

“You don’t have to be an asshole about it, man.”

That makes Parker round on him again, eyes flashing dangerously.

“Oh _I_ don’t have to be an asshole? I don't fucking believe you! What the fuck were you fucking thinking!”

Mason bristles, suddenly just as angry, “I was thinking that this is none of your fucking business, _bud_.”

He knocks his shoulder into Parker’s as he brushes past, out of the alley and on to the more crowded sidewalk, where he gets a couple looks from the few people milling about. He’s drunk and he probably looks like he recently had a dick in his mouth. A tangled knot of _something_ tightens at the centre of his chest, and he starts walking faster.

Parker follows hot on his heels.

“It’s _going_ to be my business when the fucking beat reporters come in asking how I like playing with a _cocksucker_ on my wing,” Parker hisses.

And that makes Mason stop dead on the sidewalk, heart pounding everywhere at once. He wheels back around quickly.

“I fucking knew it!”

“Huh?” Parker pulls up short, nearly bumping into him as Mason turns suddenly.

“It bothers you, doesn’t it?” Mason accuses. “When I touch you - that I _need_ to touch you,” he sneers. “Some twisted sense of obligation let you tolerate it for this long I guess, but it’s different when you _know_ the guy asking's a fag, isn’t it? Well don’t you fucking worry Parker, we’re done here.”

Mason doesn’t wait to see what he has to say to that - if anything - he spots an empty cab on the street corner and heads right towards it, leaving his teammate standing speechless on the sidewalk behind him.

He gets as far as the back seat of the cab before Parker catches up to him and snags the edge of the door, just before Mason can swing it shut.

“That’s not what I meant,” he says, breathless. “I’m not- I don’t think you’re a-” he cuts off, shooting a nervous look at the cab driver. “I didn’t mean to say that,” he finishes lamely.

Mason leans his head back against the seat and sighs, “I _really_ don’t want to do this right now man. It’s whatever.”

He pulls on the door again but Parker won’t budge. In the rear view, the cab driver’s watching them closely, annoyed.

“Seriously Parker. Let go.”

“We’re going to the same hotel Mase,” Parker says stubbornly.

Fuck.

“Get your own cab.”

Parker’s face scrunches up. “Mase, seriously, come on. Don’t be like this.”

In the front seat, the driver waits, visibly losing patience.

Mason closes his eyes in frustration and finally drops his hand. He’s drunk, exhausted, and a little sick to his stomach. He hears Parker gently shut the door beside him before walking around to the other side of the cab, the empty middle seat kept as a miserable buffer between them. The car finally pulls away from the curb as Parker gives the cabbie the name of their hotel, and then tucks himself into his seat. They don’t say a word for the rest of the trip back. 

➮ ➮ ➮

It’s not until the next morning that Mason grasps how truly and completely fucked he is.

He wakes to the blankness of his hotel room ceiling and a rolling nausea in the pit of his stomach. Lays there for a second, not yet ready to move, not sure if he’ll ever be ready to move again. 

Last night’s events play back over in his mind in startling clarity, neatly obliterating any excuse that he was just too drunk to know what he was doing. He very distinctly remembers pulling at the zipper of that guy’s leather pants, thinking about nothing more than the simple fact of wanting to.

Of course, _wanting to_ always got him the exact same fucking thing. Here - wishing he could take it all back.

Wishing his teammate hadn’t caught him sucking dick on his knees in a dirty back alley.

Mason groans and smashes his face into the pillows. Considers smothering himself. Discards the idea. He’s going to have to beg with everything he has for Parker to _please_ just forget the whole thing. He doesn’t know what he can offer. Money? Silence? The promise that Parker won't ever have to pretend to be his friend again? Fuck. What a mess.

Speaking of Parker, the hotel room is unusually quiet around him. Mason raises up on his elbows, ignoring the instant protests of both his head and his stomach as he takes in the empty room. Parker’s bed is neatly made and his bag is packed, tucked smartly by the door. There’s a bottle of Advil on the nightstand between the beds, the seal already cracked. A glass of water next to it, only half-full.

Mason downs four pills at once and drags himself out of bed, stumbling to the bathroom where he refills and drains the glass about six more times, hoping that’ll help him look just a touch less like a corpse warmed-over by the time he makes it down for breakfast. That’s probably where Parker is now, Mason thinks, and spends the rest of the time it takes to wash the night off and redress himself thinking of all the ways he could avoid him while still obtaining food for himself. He needs _something_ to settle the wreck of his stomach.

Mason is draining one last glass of water over the sink, feeling slightly less dead and with his shoes on already, when he hears the door to the room beep and click open. 

Fuck. 

Fuck fuck fuck. 

That’s gotta be Parker already. Shit, what if he was too drunk last night to really be mad? What if Mason walks out of the bathroom and Parker fucking _hates_ him now? Should he risk eye-contact? Will Parker think he’s trying something? Maybe if he just heads for the door as quickly as possible they can mutually ignore each other. Mason will have to ask for a new road roomie, say that it didn’t work out, or that he sleepwalks and it bothers Parker or something, whatever will make it clear it’s _his_ fault and not Parker’s, nothing that’ll make the higher ups suspicious-

There’s a sudden knock at the bathroom door, startling Mason out of his spiralling thoughts, and then Parker’s voice sounds through the plywood, “Mason? Buddy, you alive in there?”

Mason swallows. It’s probably a good sign that Parker’s asking, right? And his voice had sounded… mostly normal, although it was hard to tell through the wood when Mason couldn’t see Parker’s face-

“Yeah,” he grits out. “Yeah, I’m fine. I’m coming out-”

He cracks the door open an inch and sincerely wishes he could brain himself on the thing. _I’m coming out?_ Seriously? His foot was so far back his mouth at this point that he could taste his own insole. 

“Hey,” Parker says when Mason finally musters up the courage to let the door swing all the way open.

“Hey,” Mason replies stiffly, hovering awkwardly in the doorway. Sprinting out of the room wasn't out of the question.

“I brought you breakfast,” Parker says, just as stiffly, holding up a blueberry muffin wrapped in a napkin and a paper to-go cup of coffee. “Thought you might be hungry.”

Mason takes the offering, if only so that Parker will stop thrusting it up towards him meaningfully like he’s some farm-boy trying to make friends with a skittish horse. Mason takes a seat on his unmade bed, placing the muffin on the night-table and going straight for the coffee.

Parker plants himself at the foot of the other bed and watches him drink. It’s a bit unnerving. Mason vacillates between glancing back and full-on pretending that Parker isn’t there at all. His head pounds. He wishes he were literally anywhere else.

“I’m sorry I called you a cocksucker last night,” Parker says suddenly, and Mason chokes on his coffee.

“Jesus, fuck,” he coughs, wiping at his face with the napkin. “You don’t need to say it _again_ man, shit. In fact, you don’t need to apologize at all.”

Parker frowns at him, mulish. “No, I think I will.”

Of course he fucking will. Stubborn bastard.

“You don’t have to,” Mason says again, shaking his head. “I want us to forget the whole thing, okay? Can we do that?”

Parker’s frown deepens, “Look, I get if you don’t want to talk about it, and you should know that I would _never_ tell anybody, for real, but I’m not just gonna act like I don’t _know_ now that I know, you know?”

Mason’s not sure that he does. Know, that is.

“And like, it’s probably good that I know ‘cuz uh, if you don’t want people knowing then you _definitely_ need to be more careful.”

Is Mason’s eye twitching? Mason feels like his eye is twitching.

“I don’t need to be more careful,” he grinds out, trying to keep his voice calm. “Because it’s never going to happen again. So let’s forget about it now, please.”

Parker, of course, looks _upset_ by this. “What do you mean “it’s never going to happen again”. You’re _gay_ , you’re going to want to hook up with-”

“I’m not gay,” Mason interrupts him, grabbing the muffin up off the nightstand and picking at the top with maybe a touch too much hostility.

Parker hesitates, “Then what are you? And don’t say straight. I think we’re kind of past the point of plausible deniability here.”

Mason grinds his teeth together, and shrugs without looking up. “How about I’m nothing. I’m whatever it takes to keep a contract, to win the fucking cup. Straight, heteroflexible, bearded, doesn’t matter to me. At least not until I retire.”

Parker raises a critical eyebrow, not looking convinced for a second, “And last night was?”

Blood rushes to Mason’s cheeks, and he ducks behind his muffin. 

“A mistake,” he says at last. “It was- I was distracted by something else. That’s under control now though, so. Won’t be happening again.”

“Really?” Parker crosses his arms over his chest. “That’s it? You were ‘distracted’? You’re not going to want to hook up for the rest of the season? For the rest of your _career_?”

Mason squints at him.

“Dude, I hook up.”

“Ha!” Parker exclaims, like that’s some kind of gotcha, like Mason didn’t just admit to it.

“With _girls_ ,” he finishes, and Parker’s face scrunches up.

“I don’t mean pretending to take a girl home for the guys to see,” he says. “I mean like actually getting laid.”

Mason picks off another piece of muffin. “What’s there to pretend?”

Parker pauses. “Wait, seriously? You actually have sex with girls? But you’re gay?”

“Yes _seriously,”_ Mason rolls his eyes. “People talk, especially back in Van. It’d be pretty weird if every girl I took home had the same story about me not going all the way. Besides, it’s not like it’s torture.”

“Still,” Parker says, face doubtful. “You’re having sex you don’t actually _want,_ on the off chance that a rumour will start if you don’t? Sounds a little paranoid Mase.”

“Oh yeah?” Mason challenges, annoyed. Jesus Christ was he not prepared for Parker to play 20 fucking questions about this _._ He almost wishes Parker had just punched him out and been done with it. Almost.

“What the fuck would you know about it? The _one_ time I try anything else you fucking manage to hunt me down before either of us can even get off!”

And that, at least, finally makes Parker cringe back. “Ugh, dude, spare me the details here. And you’re lucky it was me who found you and not anyone else. People have camera phones, Mase, someone could have recognized you.”

“I think you mentioned that already,” Mason mutters. This, at least, he can brace for: knows by now that Parker’s first instinct in the face of uncertainty is always, _always_ to lecture.

“My point is,” Parker continues, ignoring Mason’s dark look. “That now that I _know,_ you can bring someone back here! I can even pretend to know him if anyone asks, like, I can say it’s some friend of yours from way back who you happened to run into or something. And then you just use the regular signal for needing the hotel room, but I’ll like, y’know, _know_.”

Mason stares at him, trying to pick only _one_ thing out of the about 80 infuriating things Parker just said to him. 

“Why do you sound _excited_ to lie to the team about my hypothetical hookups?”

Parker flushes. “I’m not excited,” he says defensively. “I was just thinking since yesterday that you’ve been gay _this whole time_. And like, that must’ve been really hard for you, y’know, having to lie and pretend and stuff, so. I thought that offering this might help.”

He’s so, _so_ earnest about it too. Mason kind of hates him for it.

“You seriously feel _this_ bad about calling me a cocksucker?” Mason asks, flatly. “Trust me dude, that was nothing. I’ve heard way worse.”

And that makes Parker look even _more_ tragic about this whole thing, but he drops the look and steels himself again before Mason has a chance to like, roll up a magazine and swat him with it.

“No, that’s not the point. This is just what’s fair - so that you can hook up on the road, too.”

Mason sighs, exhausted in an entirely new way. Here Parker goes, just proving Mason’s point about him being too goddamn _nice_ to just admit when something bothers him. He was honest enough last night about his feelings, the sight of Mason on his knees sending him spitting and shaking and cursing, but in the cold hard light of day Parker probably decided that hey, it’s 2006, not the goddamn dark-ages, and a _nice guy_ would be as supportive of Mason’s freak sexuality as he is of Mason’s freak touch dependency. The idiot just didn’t know when to quit.

“Whatever, Parker, fine,” Mason says finally, tossing his half-eaten muffin on the bedside table and leaning back against the pillows. “Offer what you want. Doesn’t mean I’m gonna take you up on it.”

➮ ➮ ➮

Predictably, Parker is upset when Mason doesn’t take him up on it.

He’s honestly been tempted, once or twice - the knowledge that he _could_ a dangerous enough thing in itself. He manages to resist, though, thinking of how easily the whole thing could blow up in his face, having to put that much faith in Parker and then having to see his satisfied grin first thing the next morning, that stupid smug smile that Mason can’t help but read as _look how nice I am, helping my downtrodden freak liney_. The thought alone is enough to extinguish any brief spark of desire that might hit before it can even get out of the gate.

His other problem, at least, hasn’t gotten worse. He’s still picking up enough that he’s not crashing in between games - he just has to be a bit more careful about how much he drinks when they’re out, always makes sure that a few of the other guys are heading out too, just to keep him honest. Stays well fucking clear of any men who look even _passingly_ interested, and finds a nice girl to put his hands all over for half an hour in a dark corner. 

Parker doesn’t seem to have noticed anything amiss in that department at least, even as Mason gently turns down his offers for closeness more and more often these days.

Probably he’s distracted thinking way too hard about Mason’s (nonexistent) sex life.

“It just doesn’t seem natural Mase, seriously. You’re telling me you haven’t wanted to bump uglies with anyone _all month_? Not even hypothetically? Tell me you’re at least jerking it dude - gotta clear out the pipes every once in a while. Like, medically.”

Mason closes his eyes and lets the words wash over him, refusing to rise to the bait of 95% of that sentence. He’s developed a technique for talking to Parker when he gets like this, where Mason picks out only one thing to respond to out of every five, and leaves the rest untouched.

“Have you considered that maybe I’m just not as horny as you,” he says, without opening his eyes.

He doesn’t have to look to feel Parker frowning on the other bed, face probably all screwed up like Mason just asked him to solve a particularly difficult math problem. They lost to the Caps today, and D.C.’s bruiser of a d-core didn’t pull any punches. Mason’s feeling the place where Witt drove him hard into the boards acutely, even through the pain-killers the trainers fed him afterwards.

“No, that can’t be right,” Parker concludes eventually, and Mason just barely resists sighing out loud. “You’re still just… a guy, right? And if there’s _two_ guys together then that’s gotta be like, double the horny, right?”

“I meant like, me, specifically, not all fags in general,” Mason clarifies serenely. “Like, maybe you’re just a horn-dog, by comparison.”

“Oh,” Parker says, then, “Don’t call yourself that,” with a frown (which also pisses Mason off a bit), then, “So wait, you’re telling me that you’re not thinking about sex right now?”

Mason opens his eyes and turns his head just enough to look across at the other bed. “Are you?”

Parker grins idiotically, “Uh, we’re literally talking about it so, yeah?”

“Huh,” says Mason.

“And you’re not?”

“Well, I’m literally talking about how much sex I _don’t_ have, so yeah, no, not really.”

“You could,” Parker reminds him. “Be having sex, that is.”

Mason just shrugs this time. Tired, again. The other thing hasn’t gotten worse, but it hasn’t gotten much better, either. The feeling barely even itches at him anymore - he’s hungry all the time, now.

“It’s kind of a lot of work,” is what he ends up saying. “Not really worth it.”

Parker actually considers this for a second. “Yeah I guess it would be harder like, finding someone. ‘Cuz you don’t know, right? I mean I didn’t know about you- but maybe that’s just ‘cuz I wasn’t looking for it. I mean some gay guys you can really tell, though.”

Mason’s too tired to pick at any of that. He closes his eyes again. “Yeah, and there’s always a chance that I might pick up someone who knows who I am. Might try and blackmail me or something.”

“Right,” says Parker, his voice a lot quieter.

“And then even if I _did_ find someone _,_ I’d have to get them through the hotel without anyone seeing us, and then he has to leave after without anyone seeing, _”_ Parker continues, his voice falling lower as he relaxes against the sheets.

Parker makes a little interested noise, to show he’s listening.

“Or I could go to his place, except that’s kind of risky too because nobody can know where I’m going, so I’d be completely on my own if anything bad happened, and I always worry that something bad’s gonna happen…”

Parker hums again, but Mason’s too tired to keep going now. He turns on his side, half burying his face in the pillows, then groans when he realizes the bedside light is still on. He claws at the air ineffectually, too far away to snag the chain.

There’s a rustling noise and then a click, and the room plunges into darkness. Mason makes a happy noise into the sheets, eyes closed. Mumbles, “You’re the best, Parks.”

He really hopes he imagines it when he hears Parker whisper back, just the faintest, “I could be better,” floating through the darkness next him, soft like a hand through his hair, right before Mason falls asleep.

➮ ➮ ➮

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” says Mason, flat.

Across the room Parker shrugs a little, before rallying and squaring his shoulders. Digging his heels in. “You have to admit it’s not a bad idea.”

“It’s a fucking _terrible_ idea!” Mason explodes, feeling a little wild around the edges. Parker just keeps sitting there and _arguing_ with him, like this is even a discussion.

The bastard had invited himself over all nonchalantly, like he really wanted to just chill on Mason’s couch and watch something terrible on MTV (Parker has a _thing_ about Laguna Beach. Mason allows it.) And then he went ahead and sprang _this_ bullshit on Mason, not ten minutes after planting himself on Mason’s couch.

“If I had a _week_ I could not tell you all of the reasons why this is the worst idea I’ve ever heard,” Mason continues, pacing now, back and forth in the space between his living room and the kitchen.

Parker crosses his arms over his chest defensively, “It’s a reasonable solution.”

“In what fucking way is this _reasonable,_ Parker?” Mason practically growls. “You are literally proposing the most _insane_ solution to a problem that doesn’t even _need solving_ in the first place!”

Parker, for his part, completely ignores this very good, very well-reasoned argument.

“Am I not your type? ‘Cuz I gotta say, I think you could do worse, and the pickings are apparently pretty slim to begin with.”

Mason barely resists tearing at his hair.

“Yeah, Parks, the problem I’m having right now is that I don’t want to fuck you.”

Parker squints at him. “So you _do_ want to fuck me?”

It’s a vaguely triumphant squint.

“Oh my god,” Mason says to the ceiling. “That is _so_ beyond the point here.”

Parker steps closer to where he’s pacing, careful like Mason’s going to spook if he moves too fast. His voice is all gentle when he says “It’s okay if you want to fuck me, Mase. That’s what I’m saying! It’s _good_.”

Mason stops pacing abruptly and rounds on Parker. Feels his expression turn deadly calm.

“I’m going to punch you in your fucking face now.”

“Woah,” Parker throws his hands up, placating, and takes a step right back. “Okay, easy. Let’s not resort to violence. Unless you’re into that.”

It’s a stupid joke. Parker’s not taking this seriously at all. He thinks he can just- just _say_ shit like this, insane shit like _I’ve figured out your problem, Mase, you should just fuck around with me! Like, trade handies or something. I can make it good, I swear._

And then he goes and fucking _laughs_ about it.

Mason forces a deep breath.

“Okay, you’re seriously starting to piss me off here, Parker,” Mason says, warning. “I don’t know if this is funny for you or if you’ve just got the most twisted sense of obligation in the world, but I need you to just drop it, please. You don’t need to prove anything to me.”

His voice goes a little gross and defeated around the end there, but it at least makes Parker finally, _finally_ perk up and listen.

“I’m sorry,” Parker says, actually sounding sincere about it. “This isn’t a joke to me, I swear. I’m totally serious.”

Mason sighs, weary. “Yeah, okay, you’re serious. And so am I: I’m saying no, Parks, and I don’t want to argue about it again.”

Parker tilts his head a bit, watching Mason from two feet away. Mason shifts his weight. He’s starting to feel so, so tired. He wishes he could go lie down. He wishes he didn’t want Parker to touch him, even now.

Unsurprisingly, Parker doesn’t just drop it.

“That’s the second time you’ve said that to me though.”

Mason sighs. “What?”

“The uh, thing about the-” Parker gestures vaguely with a hand, “- sense of obligation.”

Mason doesn’t know what to say. His gaze drops to the floor.

“You know I don’t have to be your friend,” Parker tells him.

And wow. Fuck. Mason did this to himself, but it still fucking hurts.

“I know,” he mumbles. There’s a nick in the wood just under his toe. Mason digs his foot in against it until he feels it pinch.

“No that’s-” Parker moves closer suddenly, right up into his space. “I don’t _have_ to be, Mase, I _want_ to be. It’s on purpose, I’m- I _want_ to do stuff for you, to _help_ you. Because you’re my best friend dude.”

Mason’s cheeks go hot. There’s this swoopy-hot feeling in his chest, tangled right alongside a big ball of guilt.

“Okay,” he breathes, forcing himself to look back up at Parker. “Okay, you’re my best friend. But it’s not like that’s a one-way street, yeah? I’m _your_ friend too, and I’m not going to let you just do stuff that isn’t good for you or like, makes you uncomfortable or whatever just for my sake, okay? That’s not fair.”

Parker smiles, this soft, dopey grin that makes him look like a golden retriever. 

“ _Mase,_ buddy. I don’t know where you got the idea that I’m this selfless martyr, but I promise you I’m really not that noble. I seriously wouldn’t offer if I didn’t want to, okay?”

Mason stares at him, starting to feel slightly - just ever so slightly - unhinged.

“So you seriously want to have gay sex,” he says, pointedly. “With me.”

Parker colours. “Not- I mean, like, yes?” he stutters. “I just want you to feel good. I want you to be able to have normal sex just like everybody else, without secret back-alley blowjobs and your stupid best friend cursing you out afterwards. And I can _give_ you that.”

Mason manages a strained smile. Like he understands, like he’ll ever be able to grasp the kind of fucked up logic that got Parker from _I want my best friend to be happy_ to _I should make myself have sex with him_.

“It’s okay, Parks, really,” he says, as gently as he can. “It’s… really _nice_ that you want to do that for me, but all of that shit… that’s never going to be something you can control. I’m never going to have _normal,_ okay _,_ not while I’m doing _this_ -” he gestures to his apartment around him, the framed jerseys on his wall, “-and maybe not even for a long time after. And I’m sorry, but a pity fuck from you isn’t going to change that.”

It comes out harsher than he means it to - all this shit he _knows_ already, shit he accepted way back when he decided to take his shot at going pro - all of it crawling up out of him and spilling slick and obtrusive over the two of them, gasoline waiting for a match. Mason breathes, and wraps arms around his middle to steady himself.

In front of him, Parker looks a little heartbroken.

“Hey no, that’s not-”

But Mason never gets to find out what it’s not - _not true, not fair, not what I meant_ \- because at that exact moment Parker steps forward, his big, careful hands landing at Mason’s elbows, his bare elbows, and Mason fucking crumples as hot light pours suddenly through him.

It’s been too long - he’s been putting it off, the stress of seeking out a new stranger every week, stop-gap, temporary fixes, and the pressure to push harder as the playoffs draw ever closer, as they attempt to clinch. It’s been too long since he’s let himself have this - the familiarity of Parker’s touch - and with both of their emotions running high and close to the surface, Mason’s body stupidly, instinctively reaches out for it.

“Fuck!” Parker exclaims, catching him by the elbows as Mason’s knees give out, as he gasps like he’s just been shot, and Parker’s eyes go wide and frantic and scared in his face.

“Mason, what the fuck?”

Mason groans and does the only thing he can - falls forward against Parker’s chest, shaky fingers curling in the soft hem of his t-shirt and not letting go. It just feels so good - _too_ good, the kind of high that you know is going to hurt tomorrow, but Mason can’t bring himself to stop.

Parker’s chest is warm and solid through cotton. Mason presses his face against it, slides his hands up under his t-shirt so that he can hold Parker _back_ , feel the perfect, intoxicating pulse of everything Parker _is_ buzzing sweet and close under his fingertips. Rushing thick through his veins.

Fuck.

He shouldn’t be doing this. Not right after claiming that he wouldn’t let Parker just keep _giving_ himself _,_ letting Mason take and take until he was all hollowed out inside.

“What? Don’t-” Parker protests when Mason tries to tear himself away. Parker firms his grip, one arm sliding around Mason’s waist, under his shirt. Skin on skin as he pulls Mason closer.

“Stay,” Parker orders, ignoring Mason’s weak attempts at fighting him. “You’ve been starving yourself.”

He says it low, his voice strangely toneless. 

Like it hurts him.

Mason falls guiltily still in his arms.

Parker tucks his face down against Mason’s hair, just breathing there for second, fast like he might be about to cry or something, before he finally inhales deep and speaks again.

“Okay,” Parker says, half-choked. “Okay, let’s just- let’s just sit down, come on.”

He pulls Mason over to the couch without once letting go, pushes him down first and then crowds him flat against the cushions with his whole body, pressing them together from knee to shoulder. He shoves his whole arm up the back of Mason’s shirt for good measure, and sticks his face right against the join of his shoulder and throat, breath fanning hot over Mason’s skin.

“Stay,” he murmurs again, soft and upset. “No arguing.”

Mason doesn’t argue. He hooks his ankle around the back of Parker’s calf to keep his weight pressing him right down into the couch and clings to all the skin he can reach, feeling sick and stupid and like this is the last time he’ll probably ever get to do this.

It’s exactly the last thing he wanted - for Parker to find this out. For Parker to feel like any of this is on him, like he’s somehow responsible for Mason’s well-being, when Mason never, ever wanted to put that burden on him in the first place. He has no idea how this got so twisted up.

“Parker,” Mason says, squirming under his weight. Parker shifts a little, but not that much. Not enough to let Mason really breathe.

“Mmm.”

“I’m sorry,” Mason whispers, voice small. “It’s not- I wasn’t trying to-”

Parker hushes him before he can even string a real sentence together.

“Don’t,” he rumbles, squeezing Mason tighter. “Just. Rest now, please.”

It’s hard to do anything else, with Parker here all around him and more- flowing through him, filling up his chest, warm and close and familiar. Better than anything else. Mason closes his eyes, and lets himself sink under, just this one last time.

➮ ➮ ➮

He wakes feeling cottony, his head stuffed and slow and heavy as he blinks up at his living room ceiling. Parker’s body is still half covering him, his right ear brushing Mason’s cheek, and Mason tries not to let the feeling claw at him. Dread and anticipation twist in his gut, knowing that Parker’s going to make him _talk_ about it, that Mason won’t have anything better to tell him than that he let a stupid thing go too far. At least that much is obvious now. His body feels different- well-rested and _full_ for the first time in… yeah, just _way_ too fucking long.

On top of him, Parker shifts and groans softly. Waking up.

“Holy fuck,” he says, muffled, right next to Mason’s ear. “You scared the living shit out of me, Mase.”

Mason shifts uncomfortably, and Parker raises his head to look at him head-on.

“Yeah,” Mason says. “Sorry.”

Parker frowns at him and pushes himself up, finally giving Mason some room to fucking _think_. They get to opposite sides of the couch, and Mason drags his hands over his face tiredly, leaves them there while Parker starts again.

“You gonna explain why the hell you’ve been denying yourself for so long that touching me had you catatonic?”

Mason drops his hands and stares up at the ceiling. “Since when do you know the word catatonic?”

Parker doesn’t laugh. Mason can picture the exact disappointed set of his eyebrows without looking. 

“Answer the question Mase.”

Mason breathes out. “I don’t know,” he says, voice angry even though he doesn’t mean it to be. “I guess it’s hard to always get enough from strangers in clubs when we go out.”

Parker is quiet for a long time, then. When he finally speaks his voice is low, almost searching.

“You haven’t been coming to me,” he says, almost to himself. Realizing. “Why? Was it- Do you not trust me any more because of what happened? Mase, you know I’d _always_ give you what you need, you being gay doesn’t change that at all.”

Mason finally turns to look at him. His frowning, upset face. Wishes he had something better to tell him. 

“Parker, you didn’t do anything wrong,” he sighs. “This was all me, I just… miscalculated, a little. Stretched myself too thin.”

“ _Why,_ though?” Parker presses. Always presses. “Why didn’t you come to me when you knew you needed it?”

Mason bites his lip. He just wanted to do this one thing - be the one who gave something to Parker instead of the other way around. Just once. Of course he couldn’t do that, fucked it up worse than if he’d left it alone in the first place. Failure sets itself bitter at the back of his throat.

“I don’t know,” Mason grinds out, again. He doesn’t have a lie, doesn’t have a single good excuse, because it was stupid, _so_ stupid to leave himself vulnerable like this.

“That’s bullshit,” Parker says, and Mason knows he’s pissed. Wishes Parker would just say he’s had enough and leave, finally. “You’re trying to tell me that you have no idea why you were straight up _starving yourself_ , for _weeks_ , even though I was right there. What, you just did that on a fucking whim?”

“Maybe I just didn’t _want_ to go to you, Parker, you ever consider that?” The words tumble out before he can stop them. Parker’s righteousness is just so fucking _grating_ sometimes. “You know I don’t have to take every little thing you try to give me, yeah? I can fucking do things for myself.”

“Oh _can you_?” Parker snaps right back, not feeling the reprimand for even a second. “‘Cuz from where I’m sitting it looks like you’re doing a pretty piss poor fucking job of it.”

“Yeah, well that’s _my problem_ , Parker, not yours. You don’t need to keep torturing yourself looking out for me, or fucking- fucking taking pity on me, whatever. The gay thing? The touch thing? That’s _my_ shit to deal with, not something you need to fucking personally lower yourself to solve for me.”

Mason drops back against the couch, panting. Okay, so _not_ unloading on Parker didn’t really work out as a plan. Maybe if the guy weren’t so fucking determined to pick Mason apart.

“Jesus, Mase, you make it sound like it’s a crime to need a little help,” Parker says, voice falling somewhere just to the left of levity.

Mason turns his head on the couch to stare at him, mouth open. “Because I don’t _need-_ ”

“You don’t need my help,” Parker interrupts. “I get it. But maybe I still just _want_ to.”

Mason shuts his mouth.

“You keep saying all this shit like I can’t just want to help you, or do stuff for you. I have to feel _obligated._ I have to secretly hate it, but still do it because, what? Because I feel sorry for you? Because I think you can’t do it without me? Fuck that.”

Mason kind of snorts, nervous, and Parker’s smile is tense. “I don’t feel sorry for you man. I _know_ you don’t need me to help you. But I gotta admit Mase, it makes me kinda sad that you think that’s the only reason why someone would do anything for you.”

Mason shifts, uncomfortable. “I don’t- I don’t think that. But c’mon, it’s not like you’re trying to do just _anything_ for me. Fucking- offering yourself up because you think I’m some lonely, pathetic fag who can’t get laid otherwise? What am I supposed to do with that?”

As usual, Parker frowns at him. “Would you fucking _stop_ \- I would never think that about you Mase.”

“Yeah?” Mason asks, chin jutting out. “Then how come it’s _such_ a crime when I have sex I don’t really want, but suddenly I’m just supposed to let you throw yourself down on the sword so that I can get a fucking hand-job? Do you know how fucking patronizing that is? Like, you’re just assuming that I’d say yes to sex with someone even when I _know_ they’re not into it. Like, _jesus_ , how little can you think of me?”

“That’s not-” Parker huffs, frustrated, and turns on Mason as much as possible without physically getting up from the couch. “Maybe it’s different because I don’t _not_ want to have sex with you, you idiot.”

That hangs in the air between them for a second, sudden and unexpected.

“What?” Mason rasps, still trying to puzzle through the double negative, whether Parker just _actually_ said-

“Fuck, I don’t know whether I should be flattered or offended,” Parker continues, which- Mason’s pretty sure that’s his line. “Like, wow, you seriously think I’d _make_ myself have gay sex with you, literally just because you’re my buddy. But at the same time, y’know, I don’t know why you keep thinking I’m this fucking _s_ _aint._ Like, I’m pretty sure even a saint would draw the line at lying back and thinking of jesus just so their gay friend can touch a dick every once in a while.”

Mason chokes on a laugh. He’s positive that he lost the thread of this conversation about three minutes back. Says the first thing that pops into his brain on auto-pilot.

“I’m pretty sure that thinking of jesus would just make it worse, bud.”

Parker laughs, and it’s a bit strained. “Yeah, probably would.”

There’s an awkward silence, then, and Mason squints at Parker from across the couch.

“So, what? Did being my road roomie turn you gay? Like is it actually contagious?”

Parker glares at him. “Don’t be an asshole,” he says, before ducking his head to pick at something invisible on his spotless jeans. “I don’t know, you just— And I was— _Fuck._ It’s going to sound stupid when I say it.”

Mason’s forehead creases and his eyebrows shoot up. His mouth feels a little dry, suddenly, and he tries to swallow against it. This can’t be happening. He’s pretty sure he’s seen this set up in a porno before - _Straight Guy’s First Time With Gay Best Friend._

“Say what?” Mason croaks.

On the other end of the couch, Parker licks his lips, like his mouth is dry too. He looks… Yeah, he looks really nervous.

“You know your eyes glow sometimes,” Parker says out of nowhere. “When you’re, y’know, doing your whole thing. Not all the time, just sometimes, when we were alone they would. And that night at the club when I saw you… you were touching that guy and your eyes were glowing and I don’t know... It’s stupid, but I thought that it was just for me.”

Mason lets that settle, chews at his lip for a second before he says, tentatively. “So, what. You were… jealous?”

Parker shrugs, but he doesn’t cut his eyes away from Mason. “Yeah. I don't know. I saw that and I was just… It wasn’t just the eyes.”

“Yeah?” Mason prompts, not even sure what he’s asking.

“Yeah,” Parker says, so low that Mason can barely make out the word. “It was… You just- You look really good with a dick in your mouth, Mase.”

Mason stares at him. He has no idea what expression is on his face right now.

“I couldn’t stop thinking about it, after,” Parker admits, just keeps admitting everything, the words tumbling out of him like he can’t stop now that he’s started. “How you were down on your knees for him. How you didn’t even hear me coming, you had your eyes closed, then, like you just wanted to _feel it._ I couldn’t get it out of my head.”

Parker looks away from him, finally, stares at the bookcase behind the couch and cuts his voice to something that’s really just barely more than a whisper. “I jerked off thinking about it, after you went to sleep,” he says, strained. “I’d never seen that before - a guy, y’know. Taking it. And it wasn’t just a guy, it was _you-”_

Parker breaks off, turns his head to look back at Mason, his face a little pained - aggrieved, like he thinks Mason’s gonna be _mad_ that Parker fucking- fucking _whacked off to the thought of Mason sucking dick_. Holy shit.

“I didn’t know how to tell you,” Parker continues, while Mason’s still reeling. “I thought it would go away, honestly. Like you said, like, maybe I’m just really horny, right? Maybe anything will do it for me. But I gotta say, it’s been like three weeks and I’m still, you know. Thinking about it. So.”

Mason feels frozen. He has no idea where to start. Parker bounces his leg against the floor, anxious, and twists his hands in his lap when Mason fails to say anything.

“It’s okay if you don’t-”

And suddenly Mason knows exactly where to start.

“Three weeks,” he interrupts, feeling slightly off-balance. Maybe a little hysterical, even. “Three fucking weeks, and you bring this up _now?_ ”

Parker freezes. “I don’t know- It was complicated and I didn’t want to-”

“Three weeks,” Mason says again, cutting off Parker’s nervous babbling. “Of pestering me about my sex life, of acting like you’re the fucking CEO of no-homo, totally straight Ally of The Year Fucking Award Winner, and the _whole time_ you’re beating your meat thinking about me taking dick? Seriously?”

Parker seems to shrink back against the couch with every word, until he’s pressed completely up against the armrest behind him. “I’m sorry?” he says, his voice about three octaves higher than normal.

“Holy shit, you owe me _so_ many orgasms,” Mason spits at him, knee-walking across the couch to swing himself right into Parker’s lap.

“Wait, what?”

Parker’s hands hover in the air on either side of Mason’s hips, uncertain, like he’s afraid to touch him.

“You still thinking about it?” Mason asks casually, hands wrapping around the back of Parker’s neck for balance. His skin is fever-hot under Mason’s touch. “What I look like with a dick in my mouth?”

Parker blushes, his face and the bottom of his throat staining red, but his hands finally, _finally_ come down to rest at Mason’s waist, just under his ribs. Tentative. “Uh, yeah?”

Mason grins, and goes in for the kill. “You wanna see what I look like with your cock down my throat?”

And Mason swears he feels Parker’s thighs clench, then, feels Parker’s dick twitch against the seat of his ass.

“Yeah,” Parker rasps, voice rough, dragged out over gravel. Mason’s smile stretches.

“Well tough,” he says. “‘Cuz I’m pretty sure it’s my fucking turn to come.”

Parker deflates, all the breath leaving his body suddenly, like he was holding it in this whole time, but he doesn’t look disappointed. The opposite. He stares up at Mason, face open and a little keen - eager, even. Mason firms his grip on either side of Parker’s throat.

“You gonna make me come, Parker?” he asks, low.

And is nearly knocked clean off the couch by how desperately Parker kisses him. Mason tightens his hands behind Parker’s head, is saved by Parker’s arms wrapping around his waist completely, hauling him close again as he kisses Mason harder, urgent and wanting and messy.

Mason makes a noise against Parker’s mouth and tries to settle him back down, petting at his chest until he relaxes minutely back into the couch.

“Slow,” Mason whispers, pulling away just enough to catch his breath. He presses their foreheads together and meets Parker’s eyes. “S’good, but you don’t have to eat me alive here. Be gentle, yeah?”

Parker nods and it rubs the skin of their foreheads back and forth, both of them already tacky with sweat. He lifts a hand to touch the side of Mason’s face, presses his fingertips down like he’s trying to feel out the shape of Mason’s jaw, and returns his gaze unflinchingly.

“You like gentle?” he asks, entirely earnest.

For some reason the question makes Mason’s stomach flutter, makes his fingers feel a little numb and buzzy where they’re resting over Parker’s shoulders. “Yeah,” he whispers back.

Parker sets his face, the same expression he gets right before a face-off when he knows exactly what play he’s going make, knows how he’s gonna get the puck right to the back of the net. His hand firms against Mason’s jaw, long fingers pressing around the shell of his ear, and he uses the grip to coax Mason’s face gently back down to his.

The kiss this time is kinda devastating. It starts slow, just Parker feeling out the shape of his mouth, nose brushing the skin of Mason’s cheek as he turns his head and nudges their lips together, again and again. Mason sinks down into it, breathes deep and settles his weight as Parker keeps kissing at him, soft and slow. Easy. Mason hasn’t spent that much time kissing like this. Mostly it’s always been a quick warm up for something else, and that’s what this is supposed to be too, except it doesn’t feel like it. It feels like they could spend all day like this, warm against each other, Parker holding him as he eases their mouths in a slow push-pull rhythm, everything spit-slick and tender.

And then, in between one breath and the next his mouth is open, and Parker’s tongue slides in hot and tentative against his. Mason makes an encouraging noise as everything gets suddenly wetter and deeper, his hands rubbing up and down the sides of Parker’s throat. Parker thumbs at Mason’s jaw, pushing at the bone to hold him open as he feels out the inside of Mason’s mouth, sucks his tongue in a hot drag that Mason feels all the way down in his gut. Mason shifts closer in Parker’s lap, drops his weight further and shudders when Parker’s arms come up around his back, holding him tight as Parker tongue-fucks into his mouth, as Parker locks his knees and presses up with his hips, the same motion again.

Mason bears down and kisses back harder, moaning, feeling suddenly desperate, like he could jump right out of his skin. His veins buzz with the feeling of Parker all around him, with Parker’s energy running _through_ him, and he has no idea when that started, but he’s not sure he can stop it now. Not with everything so close up under the blood like this.

“Fuck,” he tries, muffled against Parker’s lips. His dick strains up uncomfortably against the front of his sweats, and he grinds mindlessly forward on Parker’s stomach, chasing relief.

He’s not expecting it when Parker’s hand closes over him suddenly, squeezing his cock tight even through the fabric. Mason rips his mouth away to breathe, harsh.

“Holy fuck. God, Parker.”

His voice is wrecked, already strained and Parker laughs at him a little, delighted. “Good?”

Mason grinds forward against the palm of Parker’s hand, and Parker presses it back for him. Hard resistance. 

“Hand on my dick, good,” Mason relays in between gasping breaths, feeling that Parker might want a little feedback here.

“No kidding,” is Parker’s response. He tightens his grip around Mason and looks down at his hand consideringly. Mason looks down too. The line of his cock is stark against the grey of his worn sweatpants, straining in between Mason’s fingers. Unambiguous.

“You don’t have to,” Mason says, meaning _you don’t have to go full hog on my dick if you’re not ready_. “This is good.”

Parker looks up at him, something hot and challenging in his eyes. “But what if I _want_ to?”

Mason can’t help it - he laughs, breathlessly, his head dropping down between his shoulders. 

“Yeah,” he breathes. “Yeah, okay. Go for it then.” 

And that’s all that Parker needs to get his hand into Mason’s pants, the waistband stretching over his wrist as he folds his fingers around Mason’s cock. Mason gasps, aware that Parker is staring at him but not caring. Parker can stare all he fucking wants if he’ll keep touching Mason like this.

“Hmmm,” Parker says, tilting his head musingly, like he’s considering a difficult problem, and Mason grunts. “What?”

“Just-” Parker doesn’t finish the thought. He lets go of Mason’s dick and uses both hands to push down his sweatpants, leaving them halfway across Mason’s thighs. They can’t really go any further without Mason getting up to take them off, but Parker looks satisfied with this. He rests his hands on the bare tops of Mason’s thighs and just kinda… stares at his dick.

“Parks,” Mason says impatiently, waving a hand in front of Parker’s face. “You good here?”

“Yeah,” he says, this dumb little smile on his face. “It’s just, y’know,” he waves a hand at Mason’s junk, like Mason has any idea what that means. “Wow.”

Mason rolls his eyes and tries to scoot closer to Parker, the band of his sweatpants pinching when he tries to sink lower. He settles for getting a hand in Parker’s hair (as soft as he’d always imagined) and the thumb of the other presses down at Parker’s lower lip. 

“If you’re done being impressed by my dick now, did you wanna, you know, touch me?”

Parker stares up at him with his mouth pulled open for a second, and then practically jumps to comply.

His hockey-calloused hand feels maddeningly good as it moves over Mason’s already leaking cock, dragging sensitive skin.

“This good?” Parker asks, his free hand gripping Mason’s right hip, long fingers spread and just touching at the top of Mason’s ass.

“Yeah,” Mason gasps, fucking up into the circle of Parker’s fingers. “Tighter, a little, and just move it- There, yeah. _Yeah_.”

Parker’s staring at him again. Mason’s thumb is still pressed against his stupid mouth, and Mason moves it, drawing it through tacky spit. Parker doesn’t look shocked - he looks like he knows he’s in position, and the puck is sliding right to his tape. Like he’s seconds away from a sure goal.

Mason kisses him, long and hard and panting right into Parker’s mouth, and Parker’s hands tighten everywhere. On his dick. Around the globe of his ass. Mason is up on his knees, sweatpants stretched taut over his thighs, and he fucks artlessly into Parker’s grip once, twice, three more times, and comes.

“Fuck,” Parker says, maybe, probably, mostly muffled because he’s still kissing Mason through it, still moving his hand even though it’s sticky and come-soaked now, and Mason lets him, his dick kicking once more before he has to catch Parker’s wrist and hold it still. 

When Mason pulls back there’s jizz all over the bottom of Parker’s t-shirt.

“Whoops,” Mason says, gesturing, and Parker looks down. Shrugs.

“No bigs,” he says and gets his hands in the hem, takes it off carefully so that he doesn’t get spunk all over his face. Uses it to wipe at his sticky fingers.

“Gross,” Mason says when Parker drops the shirt on the floor, ‘cuz it’s _his_ floor after all. Parker smirks.

“So it’s fine when it’s all over me, but you’re upset when I put the cum-rag on the floor?” he asks, and then leans forward to kiss Mason before he can answer.

Mason kisses him back, biting, and leans scant room between their lips to say, “There’s a very limited shelf life to the stuff. It’s sexy for the first ten seconds after it leaves my body.”

Parker rolls his eyes and goes back to kissing him, both hands resting at Mason’s bare waist now. They keep at it for a while, warming up again, even though Parker is clearly straining at the zipper of his jeans in between them. It’s got to be painful by now, but Parker doesn’t seem to be in a rush.

He moves his mouth down, kisses at Mason’s neck and then right behind his ear, and says, “Wanted to see you come.”

And that makes Mason pause, Parker’s mouth still worrying at the skin of his jaw as he puzzles through the words. 

“Uh, you just did?” he says, confused, to the back of Parker’s shoulder.

Parker pulls away to look at him, “Not really? I mean, _yeah_ , kinda I did, but like, my eyes were closed. ‘Cuz we were kissing and all.”

He’s blushing. Mason puts both hands on either side of Parker’s head, frames his heated face with his thumbs, and leans in to peer at him. 

“So, when you said that you just like to make me feel good, y’know, ‘cuz we’re such good _buddies_ ,” he punctuates this statement by biting at Parker’s jaw, scraping with teeth. Parker inhales fast through his nose. “You meant that you _really_ like to. Like, it gets you off.”

Parker clutches at him, and when Mason pulls back he’s even more flushed, patchy red all the way down his chest.

“No,” he says, and Mason raises an eyebrow. “I mean, not exactly. Like. I’m not using my friendships to get off or anything, I’d never— I like doing nice things because it’s _nice_ , it makes other people happy, that’s it. But-” he takes a deep breath, bites his lip. “Yeah. In bed I like. Pleasing people. Kind of a lot.”

Mason leans down to kiss the tops of his overheated cheeks, tender.

“So you like to get off on getting me off?” he murmurs, tilting Parker’s head up so that he has to meet Mason’s eyes head-on.

“Yeah,” Parker says, all sweaty and breathless. “And I wanna see next time.”

“We can do that,” Mason promises. “But for now let’s get _you_ there. Been hard for so long.”

“Yeah,” Parker says absently, watching Mason’s hands as he tugs open Parker’s jeans, pulls him out over the waistband of his boxers. Parker’s cock is flushed purple-dark and wet at the tip.

Mason runs an experimental hand up the blood-heavy length of it, and Parker groans, head dropping back on the couch. Mason smiles and kisses at the exposed underside of his jaw, then slides his mouth up to Parker’s ear.

“You still thinking about it?”

Parker’s head shoots back up so fast he nearly brains Mason in the process. Mason ducks out of the way quickly, and almost laughs at the gut-punched expression on Parker’s face.

“Christ Parks, you’d think I’m the Wayne Gretzky of blowjobs or something.”

Parker laughs. “Wayne Gretzky of gay blowjobs, I’m betting,” he jokes back, his grin wide and dopey.

Mason kisses it, and then slides up off the couch.

“Wait, for real?” Parker says, voice slightly strangled, as Mason rises and takes a second to tuck himself back into his sweatpants. There’s a red imprint across the skin of his thighs where the waistband was digging in for too long.

“Fuck,” Parker swears. “I’m gonna blow my load in like tens seconds flat Mase.”

Mason laughs and folds to his knees, grateful that he let the interior decorator lady talk him into this area rug. Anything is better than hardwood for this, honestly.

“You’re really pumping my tires here bud,” he says, slapping the outside of Parker’s thigh encouragingly. “Just relax, okay? I don’t give a shit if you shoot off the second I get my mouth on you. Just want you to feel good, yeah?”

Parker nods uncertainly, his hands curled into fists at his sides.

He doesn’t shoot off the second Mason gets his mouth on him, but he doesn’t last that long, either. Mason can hear him gasping breath above him, feel his thighs trembling under Mason’s hands. Whatever Parker might imagine, Mason isn’t an expert at sucking dick. Doesn’t even really do it that often, so it’s pretty gratifying to feel Parker get to the edge so quickly, breaths shaky and fingers tightening in Mason’s hair. Not pushing, just holding him there, gently. Mason can feel it when Parker’s muscles lock, his body clamping down as he tries to hold on, dig his heels in against the rising edge of pleasure. There’s a second where Mason wonders if it’s going to be a real problem, if Parker won’t be able to let go after all, but then he feels Parker’s dick kick against his tongue, hears Parker moan, and come floods his mouth.

“Fuuuuuck,” Parker groans. His fingers are gentle where they brush around the tips of Mason’s ears. Mason holds himself there, lets Parker finish in his mouth and makes himself swallow even though it’s been a while. Not the greatest taste, but he’ll live.

He finally pulls back when Parker goes boneless on the couch, wipes the back of his hand over his lips and rests his forehead against Parker’s thigh while he catches his breath. Soon enough Parker’s fingers scrabble at Mason’s shoulders, his knee nudges at Mason’s arm.

“Come here,” Parker insists, making honest to God grabby-hands, and Mason wants to make fun of him but climbs back up on top of him instead, straddling Parker’s hips.

Parker kisses him immediately, tongue and everything, and moans at the taste of himself in Mason’s mouth.

“Of course you like that,” Mason mutters under his breath, and Parker grins back like the sicko he is and kisses him again.

“You realize,” he says, kissing at Mason’s mouth and cheeks and jaw, “that you just made one of my literal wet dreams come true,” Parker gives him a serious look. “For real. Three weeks Mase.”

Mason smirks, cocky. “And you’re very welcome.”

Parker growls and moves suddenly, hands under the back of Mason’s thighs to lift and dump him on his back on the couch. Follows him quickly down, covering Mason with his body. “Douchebag,” he murmurs, right up against Mason’s throat.

Mason smiles and wraps his arms around Parker’s neck to keep him there. “You’re the one who pumped my tires, bud. Only have yourself to blame.”

Parker groans and leans up to catch his mouth again.

➮ ➮ ➮

**Author's Note:**

> Wow, remember 2006? ‘Cuz I sure don’t. And yes, for personal reasons I did make Kevin Bieksa a furry in this, what about it?
> 
> As always, comments and kudos are highly appreciated!  
>   
> (I made a [twitter](https://twitter.com/7sevener) to publicly agonize over my WIPs if you wanna come hang out!)  
>   
> Edit: This fic was amended to remove an earlier reference to Rick Rypien, in the interest of respecting his memory.  
>   
> Note: If any of you are wondering why bisexuality doesn’t get even a mere passing mention in this fic, first let me say that as a bisexual person myself, I felt a great deal of conflict about excluding it. However, I felt that given the time period, the limited gains in LGBTQ+ awareness across pro sports at the time, and the fact that Mason has been closeted for his entire life, neither he nor Parker would be in a position to recognize bisexuality as, you know, an actual valid sexuality and not just like, a survival behaviour. I hope it came through that Parker is bi, but I’m putting it here explicitly because I probably won’t write the years of his experience like, loving up on Mason and coming to terms with that. But to be clear - he does do those things.


End file.
